The invention relates to image file generation, and more particularly, to systems and methods for creating embedded target images.
An embedded system is an electronic system that utilizes a CPU chip, but is not a general-purpose workstation, desktop or notebook computer. Embedded systems generally use microprocessors, custom-designed chips, or both. They may be used in mobile phones, planes, trains, space vehicles, machine tools, cameras, consumer and office appliances, PDAs (personal digital assistants), robots, and toys. In embedded systems, the software typically resides in a non-volatile memory device, such as a flash memory or ROM (read only memory) chip, in contrast to a general-purpose computer that loads its programs into RAM (random access memory). In order to comply with various hardware configurations for embedded systems, several source files and/or header files are conventionally modified by manual revision of source code thereof, object files are then generated by compiling the modified source files and/or header files. The object files are employed to generate target images to be written to a non-volatile memory device of an embedded system. Direct revision of source code of source files and/or header files is, however, time-consuming and risky.